Abu Ghraib abuser gets jail sentence
A US military policewoman behind some of the most ghastly photographs from Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison has been sentenced to six months in jail for her role in the abuse.
A military jury ruled late on Tuesday that Specialist Sabrina Harman, 27, will also be reduced in rank to private and receive a bad conduct discharge.
Harman was convicted on Monday of four charges of maltreatment of detainees, one charge of conspiracy to maltreat detainees and dereliction of duty.
A former pizza restaurant manager, Harman is credited with setting up one of the most infamous pictures from Abu Ghraib – that of a hooded inmate in rags standing on a box with electrical wires attached to his hands.
International publication of those photographs led to widespread condemnation of US practices in Iraq at a time when US forces were trying to bring the country under control after the 2003 invasion.
She also posed grinning behind a pyramid of naked Iraqi prisoners, giving a thumbs-up in front of a corpse wrapped in plastic, and wrote the misspelled word “rapeist” on the leg on one of the inmates.